The South Callaway R-II School District's instructional coaches presented to the Board of Education Wednesday night. The board also discussed possible changes to the district's facility rental/use agreement and received updates from each school in the district.
Instructional coaches
The district's instructional coaches gave the board an overview of what their day looks like during the board meeting. The coaches still teach a class but also serve as not only technology integration support but any kind of support a fellow teacher may need.
Mary Van Orden, director of curriculum and instruction for South Callaway, previously told the Fulton Sun that the days of a teacher standing in front of the room lecturing while students take notes is gone. The district added instructional coaches this school year in an effort to help teachers with that transition.
Superintendent Kevin Hillman said he is excited to see how the addition of instructional coaches will impact the district.
"This is the difference maker," Hillman told the board Wednesday night.
Honoring Veterans
South Callaway raised $1,727.61 for Honor Flight, an organization which transports veterans to Washington, D.C. so they can visit memorials dedicated to honor their service.
Principal Leigh Dunlap and the Early Childhood bulldog leadership team presented the district's contribution during a Veterans Day event in the high school's gym Tuesday.
South Callaway Schools held a district-wide Veterans Day Assembly Tuesday to honor those who have served. In the past, each school held individual events on Veterans Day. This is the first year that the schools worked to put on a district-wide event to honor veterans.
At the board meeting, each school principal discussed how their students contributed to the student-led event. The middle school and high school bands performed together. Those schools' choirs also performed. The middle school student council led a flag folding ceremony, the elementary junior student council presented service pins to veterans in attendance and the district played a video created by a video production class.
EOC scores to affect student grades
High school students in the district will soon receive letters about their Missouri Assessment Program (MAP) End of Course (EOC) exams in December. The school will apply five percent of that test score to the student's course grade.
The board voted 4-1 last month to allow South Callaway High School to again attach a grade to students' EOC scores. The board's vote rescind its 2011 decision that stopped attaching a grade assessment to the exams.
High school teachers presented research and proposals to the board last month. During their presentation, they said that 26 teachers at the high school all agreed that attaching a grade incentive to the EOC exams would motivate students to perform better on the tests.
The school also surveyed students and asked them what motivates their performance on standard testing. Of the students surveyed, 46 percent they are motivated when their grade is affected.
District discusses updates to facility rental/use agreement
The district has been putting money and resources into athletic field improvements. Now, South Callaway Schools is preparing itself for when others request to use the district's newly improved fields. At the board's meeting Wednesday night, they discussed potential changes to the district's facility rental/use agreement. The current facility use agreement hasn't been updated since about 2008.
Potential changes include increasing the rental price, associating different fees with different types of organizations that may request use of the fields and assigning priorities to the types of organizations or activities that may take place on the field. For example, school-related activities and events would take precedence over non-South Callaway groups wanting to use the spaces.
South Callaway modeled its first draft of the facility rental/use agreement after what Blair Oaks R-II School District uses.
Activities Director Tony Brandt told the board Wednesday night that he has already received requests for non-South Callaway groups to use the football field, which the district spent $1.52 million improving this year.
"With our new facilities we are going to be inundated with requests to use these facilities. It's already started this past fall," Brandt said.
The district allowed Westminster College to use its football field for practices after bad weather. The board voted 6-1 at its June meeting to approve more than $330,000 to be spent on baseball/softball field improvements. ATG Sports Industries, Inc., the sports facility company that worked on changes to the school's football field, took on the baseball/softball field project.
The board and district will continue to discuss and research appropriate prices and terms for the district's facility rental/use agreement.
Attendance
Elementary Principal Corey Pontius said the school's attendance rate for November has improved over last month. In October, the elementary school saw a significant amount of absences due to illness. Pontius said he was worried how those absences would affect each student's overall attendance. After this month's steady attendance, he said he is less worried.
At the board's Wednesday night meeting, other schools in the district all reported steady, high attendance rates so far for this year.
The district earned 95 percent of possible attendance points on its Annual Performance Report (APR) this year compared to 75 percent the year before. At the district's August Board of Education meeting, Hillman said the district made attendance a focus last August. It has continued to focus on increasing its attendance rate this school year.
"Kids need to be here before they can learn," Hillman said at the board's August meeting. "We will work hard to have improvements where we can."
Megan Favignano can be reached at (573) 826-2417 or [email protected].